Re: Eastman price gouging on overseas sales
HPA doesn't carry everything in the Eastman line, and as Jeff points out, the costs wind up being about the same.
Most orders aren't going to involve exchanges for size, so it makes no sense to include a 20% overcharge on all overseas orders to cover those that do require an additional shipping fee (especially if Eastman has the same policy for UK and EU buyers -- what, no return shipping surcharge for them?). A fairer way to do it would be to not charge the 20% extra but to require an extra shipping fee on exchanges. This is more economically efficient, allocating costs to those who actually incur them (i.e., those who don't get their sizing right) while providing an incentive to order correctly.
As for "extra paperwork," c'mon. A couple of postal forms that take a few minutes to fill out = 20% surcharge? Uh, no. And how complicated it is to multiply something by .8? "Keeping things simple" really means "keeping an extra hundred pounds or so without disclosing the price discrepancy."
Finally, what with the additional competition for Eastman from Good Wear and now Kelso, you'd think they'd try to take advantage of the pricing differential and 20% discount for U.S. buyers. That would make their prices quite competitive, but apparently they'd rather keep their undisclosed 20% windfall. That's their business decision to make, just as it's my decision to not buy from them.
This sucks for all non-EU buyers, but there is something particularly galling about ELC making reproductions of vintage U.S. flight gear and hawking them to American buyers at artificially inflated prices. Blech. (The same goes for Aero, too. Now I'm glad I got mine through Mark Moye.)[/quote]
The questions raised are valid and the topic is interesting and worthy of discussion. I'm not trying to defend ELC per se, but I am trying to present a fully-illuminated alternate perspective to what is being bandied about. Time is money, and what you dismiss as just some simple postal forms may not be that. I can't speak for UK forms, but ELC ships via Fed Ex and I do know Fed Ex international forms from my own use and they take about 15 minutes to accurately complete. And if you have a commercial Fed Ex account and ship commercial packages, the forms are more detailed. Knowing how EU nations come under the tax gun more than we do in the USA, I'd not be surprised if the forms ELC fills out could take up 20-30 mins. to complete. If you think 15-30 mins. isn't much time, maybe you'd be willing to give that much time up for free on every job you do. That much time on every order would add up very fast.
Yes, ELC and Aero could discount non-EU sales, but they must have sound reason for doing as they do, and that could transcend what you see as gouging. Charging only customers who make returns for the return shipping on exchanges certainly can be done, but it isn't the way things are typically done in retail sales. It's the same thing for credit card sales, where you could discount non-credit card sales, as HPA chooses to do and which is, admittedly, very fair - only those who elect to pay w/ CC pay the fees the banks charge. But most retailers work with a markup of 2.2 - 2.75 times their cost of goods, which covers all the evils of doing business, including credit card fees, postage on exchanges, etc., though those who don't pay with credit cards, those who don't make exchanges, etc., end up subsidizing those who do. Businesses typically work on simple formulas that function well enough for all buyers to make the cost of doing business less costly, and that allows the businesses to remain viable so you can buy the products you like buying from these retailers. If you work for someone else and aren't directly involved in understanding how your company's profits have to justify your own pay and existence, then you may not understand or appreciate how difficult and precarious it can be for the small business to stay viable and in the game. You complain of what you perceive as gouging, but you have no idea what real profit looks like in terms of the big-box merchants and what they make on each item sold. And because you don't see this and don't know about it and never will, we all just keep the ball rolling and buy ...
Big-box merchants deal in staggering volume compared to what we are talking about here and its all relevant to expenses and profit models. The average item sold at full price in L. L. Bean would have a profit of 5 - 10 times cost built in the retail price (a shirt made in China), while some items would operate on less profit (Bean Boots made in the USA). Big-box stores have significant expenses and overhead, and may even have shareholders to satisfy, so profit models that seem excessive, and they often do, do have some justification. Working the basic numbers on what the approximate labor and materials cost premium manufacturers to make top-notch flying jackets, companies like ELC and, even more so GW, make more like 3 times their actual cost to produce an A-2. Is it justified? For ELC, more likely the answer is, yes, as they have significant expenses and overhead and have to have a wholesale price, whereas GW has few of these factors to contend with. And, presumably, Aero would have expenses very similar to ELC.
I also sent an e-mail to HPA to check if they carried all ELC items and they replied, saying the only ELC items not carried are those items ELC will not wholesale: Elite-unit items, storage boxes, coasters, etc. They do carry all of the sweaters, which was how this thread got started, I think, so it would seem they carry 98% or more of ELC goods. That's hardly justification for saying they don't carry all ELC goods (though "not all" is true, the perceived implication is that there are many they do not, which is not so), and most of what they carry is available for less that what you'd pay with ELC and free of attendant issues of VAT, customs duty and import hassles, etc.
I don't give a rat's ass where you make your purchases: Aero, ELC, BK, GW, HPA, Cockpit, etc. But I do like trying to keep a balanced perspective on that which we discuss, and I like seeing facts without much bias or personal agenda slipped in.
Saunders